God blesses those who are poor and realize their need for him, for the Kingdom of Heaven is theirs.
Matthew 5:3
When I was growing up my brothers and I would play the game ‘mercy’. We would grab both hands, link finger and try to get above the other one, forcing their hands backwards and to explode in pain. The punishment would continue until someone said, ‘Mercy!’
The beginning of faith is the moment we say, ‘Mercy! I give up. I can’t do it. I need help. I yield’
Everyone wants to be the powerful one who has it all together and can be the commander of their own destiny. However, Jesus tells us that it is the one who are poor (Luke’s account adds in spirit) and who realise their need for him. This is the incredibly irony of Jesus’ first teaching in his ministry. He tells us that for as long as we are fighting for ourselves, we miss the very thing that we long for. However, when we realise that need God, we gain the Kingdom of Heaven. It is a gift to be received but never taken or earned.
There is no one that will find it harder to enter the kingdom than the proud man who thinks that they can do it all by themselves. There has to be a moment of humility, the realisation of our poverty and the openness to help. For as long as we are holding onto our lives, we lose them.
To these young men that started following Jesus, who were not the spiritual elite, were not the highly educated, were not rich, this was brilliant news. Jesus wanted to tell them that his kingdom if for the no-hopers, the losers, the beaten up, the defeated, the poor, the overlooked and the lost. It is not a Kingdom for the elite but is given to those who realise that they need it. They just have to yield.
